Sitting on a high table in a wine bar bistro that we never frequent, I can’t help but feel out of place. Especially since I’m drinking alone. Maggie’s in the bathroom-- taking forever, I might add--and I reach in my purse to grab my copy of Her Fragile Heart while I wait.

All it takes is rereading a single passage from this well-worn copy for my heart to slow and for me to relax. Every time I open this book it’s like I’m being comforted by my oldest friend. Whoever wrote this novel gets me in a way no one else ever has.

Maggie slides back to the table and I dog-ear my page, hoping to get it out of her sight before she starts commenting on my choices. I’m not quick enough.

“Greta, I don’t get the obsession. That story is depressing. Why do you keep reading it?”

“It’s not depressing,” I say defensively. “It’s real.”

She snorts.

“Maybe it didn’t win any fancy awards,” I say. “But it won my heart.”

Mags rolls her eyes. “Oh, girl, lines that cheesy tell me you need a real man. Stat.”

I scoff. “Whatever. The author gets me on a literary level. That means something.”

Mags smiles. “But you need someone on a physical level.”

Ignoring her I focus on the menu. Everything is over priced. Yes, I’m practical--I’m also running a family on a single income with Christmas a few weeks away. “We should have gone to St. Nicks.”

“I didn’t want the local dive bar. Or anything fried. And since the guys--and kids--aren’t with us, we should treat ourselves to a proper meal with cloth napkins. And no chicken strips.”

I bite my bottom lip. It’s true. I can’t think of the last time I sat down at a restaurant with a wine menu.

We order, and once my glass of Merlot is poured, I take a long sip. I never pause like this, it’s always one thing or the other. It’s Milo’s preschool field trip or Lucy forgetting her lunch money or folding laundry or making dinner or... you get the idea. I’m a single mom and running on fumes most days.

“You’re right, Mags. This is really nice.” I raise my glass and clink against her club soda.

“So make me a Christmas promise. No more of that book for a month,” Mags says. “It’s a torture device, I swear.”

I exhale, knowing I’m beating a dead horse, but I want my sister to understand why this book has meant so much to me since Luke died. “Every time I read it I think, okay, if Sarah, the girl in the book could move on, then maybe I can move on too.”

Maggie pats my arm in understanding. “I love you. Even if you’re a nerd who roped me into book club, I hope I can be half the mom you are.”

“Shush.” I blush, hating the compliment. “I’m just ready, you know? To start living again. Really living.” As I tell her this, my eyes sweep across the bar and land on a man who is so not my type.

Meaning: sexy, built, and sporting a man bun that Portland hipsters are writing jealous blogs about.

I’m not saying Luke wasn’t sexy--but he was all rough edges and calloused hands--not like this pretty boy with a chiseled body. A body that would never be interested in this mom-jean-wearing widow.

The fact that this stranger has a beard is the icing on my gingerbread house.

“Um, you okay Greta?” Maggie asks as the waitress brings us a cheese plate.

“What? No one,” I say, bringing the glass to my mouth and taking a sip to avoid thinking about the situation happening between my legs.

I swear to God I never get all hot and bothered like this. Ever.

But that man will not stop looking at me. Like looking at me.

It’s been a long time since my body was taken care of by a man. And right now, I’m imagining it all quite clearly.

“No one what? Seriously, are you all right? It looks like you saw a--” Her eyes follow my gaze across the room and land on my mountain man bun. “Oh. Oh! Greta!” My sister is squeezing my knee from under the table and has that crazed look in her eyes that people get when they think there’s the possibility of living vicariously through you for an evening.

“Shush,” I say, rolling my eyes. Taking the cheese knife, I cut off a chunk of brie. “There’s no way.”

“No way what? You are thoughtful, resourceful, and the most reliable person I know.”

“The three words that can get any man hard,” I snort, thinking those adjectives sound eerily close to the way I’d describe the heroine in the book I’m obsessed with.

“Oh my god, who are you?” Maggie covers her mouth in shock, not used to me speaking so freely.

“Seriously, Maggie, look at me.” I motion over my body with a look of dread. I remember after Milo was born, I wouldn’t even let Luke look at me unless I had on a cami. I may have a pretty enough face, but I know what I look like naked. An actual woman. Not a supermodel like the guy at the bar is probably used to dating.

“You’re crazy, you know that?”

“Oh, I’m pretty clear on what I am. Crazy, resourceful, and reli--”

Maggie cuts me off. “You know what I meant. I meant, in short, that you are amazing.”

I roll my head back groaning. “I don’t know, Mags, remember Octoberfest when I was dancing with that old guy who ended up being a total creeper? My guy-radar is all off. And even if it weren’t, no guy would want this.”

“Hey, stop it,” Maggie insists. “You put yourself down constantly as a defense mechanism. Maybe it’s time you remember how to be the girl Luke fell in love with. Truth is, he wouldn’t even recognize you right now.”

“Ouch,” I say, stuffing more cheese in my mouth.

“I know you like to say that Luke ruined you for all other men, that none could compare, but maybe that isn’t the truth.”

I look down at my empty glass of wine, wondering why Maggie insists on making things heavy.

“And what is the truth, exactly?”

“You’re scared.”

“Of what?” I ask, blinking wildly, refusing to cry.

“Of getting hurt again.”

There’s a lot of truth in her words.

I’ve spent the last few years getting in a healthy place emotionally but until I take a leap and put myself out there again, I’ll stay stuck.

I know that I’m ready to meet someone, but that someone would have to be willing to deal with all my baggage.

And right now mountain man bun is walking toward me.

No way in hell is he that guy.

“I can’t even with that,” I say quietly. “He’s so ...”

“Interested,” Maggie says with a smile. “Just pretend you aren’t a mom and a PTA member and a Girl Scout troop leader.”

“Who am I supposed to be then?”

Maggie grins. “Greta, a sexy woman here on vacation, visiting her sister.”

As the man saunters toward our table, a swagger in his step that makes me jittery, Maggie adds, “It’s role-play, Greta, not rocket science.”